Two Eighteenth-century Women Players of the Viola da Gamba

The Empress of Germany well defined the attainments of Pericles’ ideal woman—who was to be prized if no one spoke of her either in praise or blame—when she announced that a woman’s life should be made up of clothes, children, cooking and church. A century or so ago, such a statement would have been quite unnecessary, for our great-grandmothers welcomed each of these obligations as the sweetest duties of life. But, somehow, for some unaccountable reason, much of woman’s tender grace seems to have faded with the Victorian era, and to-day “nous avons changÉ tout cela.” Children, clothes, cooking, are the very things—except the clothes—that the modern woman, with her club and other interests, deals with most lightly. She would far rather rush into the battle of life and fight like her Amazon ancestry. She would far rather assume some definite career like her brethren of the sterner sex. Perhaps she does not cut quite such a good figure as she did fifty years ago, but her unceasing efforts to attain prominence have revealed her to be dowered, now and again, with an intellect capable of undertaking all the duties dear to her departed sisters, and rendering service in other provinces besides.

The emancipation of woman is a steady growth, and to-day there are few professions in which she does not compete side by side with man. In the rough and tumble of the battle, she must lose much of her ephemeral qualities, but, fortunately, there are careers open to her in the sphere of Art where her feminine evanescence is the principal charm of her work. In music more especially, her emotional value and quick instinct are indispensable, and here she retains her personality with ease. Whatever may be the general opinion of woman’s work in the realm of musical composition, her success as an executant is undeniable. She cannot perhaps build Masses like Bach, or Oratorios like Handel, but she can interpret the works of the great masters with much spontaneous insight, and one cannot forget that she has written some of our most popular songs. “Annie Laurie” was the work of Lady Jane Scott; Lady Arthur Hill wrote “In the Gloaming,” and Lady Scott Gattie composed the widely-known ballad “Douglas, Tender and True.” “The Campbells are comin’,” “The Land o’ the Leal,” and “The Laird o’ Cockpen” were all the work of Lady Nairne, while the languorous melody of “Juanita” emanated from Mrs Elizabeth Morton’s pen. Undoubtedly woman’s most appropriate place in music is as a singer, for, look back as far as you will, you will find her occupied in singing. The Egyptian women danced and sang to the accompaniment of clapping hands. The Hebrew women pointed the story of their songs with dramatic actions; they sang gaily at festivals, and chanted dirges at funerals, and, although the men—mark you—might join in if they felt inclined to do so, yet the women were the acknowledged leaders. Then, again, one of the cherished duties of those graceful women—the Greek Muses—was to sing songs at the banquets of the immortals, and the principal occupation of the Sirens, who sat upon rocks, was to sing ditties to the passing mariners. The record of woman’s singing is certainly ahead of man’s, and it is regrettable that in these days she does not continue to be ahead of him. It should be woman’s prerogative to sing, while men could monopolise the more technical branches of music, such as composing, and playing the flute and string and brass monsters. Go to one of the fashionable concerts devoted to that poor pale thing, “The Modern Ballad,” and see if the incongruity presented by six feet of muscular manhood warbling about stars kissing, and moons flirting, does not jar your sense of the fitness of things. Listen to the same sentiments voiced by a woman, however, and you will find the incongruity vanishes, and mere trash becomes sentiment.[32]

Unfortunately every woman is not blessed with a melodious singing voice, yet the instinct to sing being in her, she has turned to the best imitation of the human voice she can find—i.e. the violin and the violoncello. To-day these instruments, and even the viola, count innumerable votaries, both professional and amateur, among the fair sex, but who was the first brave lady to “saw the catgut with the horse’s tail” history does not recount. Where history fails however myth steps in and supplies us with the information that the invention of producing musical sounds from a stretched string originated in the twang of Diana’s hunting bow. Then the beautiful poetess Sappho—whose name has been handed down to us much besmirched for the reason that she was in advance of her time—is assigned the honour of inventing the fiddle-bow mounted with horse hair. St Cecilia—whose name now graces numberless Musical Societies—is said to have united instrumental with vocal music in divine worship, about the year 230. Little is known accurately of this saint, but legendary lore pronounces her to have been a noble Roman lady who embraced Christianity, and was forced by her parents into a union with a pagan named Valerian. She eventually converted both her husband and his brother to her faith, and they all three suffered martyrdom for their convictions. The passing phase in her history which relates that she frequently united instrumental music with that of her voice in praising the Lord, has inspired artists to paint and mould her in an attitude of praise with the organ and other musical instruments by her side. Whether she played the viola da gamba, or indeed any instrument, is a fact now lost in oblivion; in any case Domenichino has exquisitely represented her in the act of drawing the bow across a handsome bass-viol in his immortal picture now in the Louvre Collection in Paris. After St Cecilia a prominent English lady, who was the daughter of “Old King Cole” of fiddling fame, was a skilled musician according to Geoffrey of Monmouth. She is apparently a solitary example of feminine musical talent in England at that date.

The position occupied by woman in the music of mediÆval times had greatly deteriorated from that occupied by St Cecilia, yet she was still thought worthy of portrayal, and we find a picture of her playing a viol with four strings on the painted roof of Peterborough Cathedral, which dates from about the year 1194. Two years later the names of several lady minstrels or “jongleuresses” figure in the code of laws which the Corporation of Minstrels presented in 1321 to the “Prefect” of Paris for signature. Heading the women is “Isabel la Roufelle,” and after her “Marcel la Chastaine, Liegart, fame Bieuveignant, Marguerite, la fame au Morne,” etc., and lastly “Adeline, fame de l’Angloise” and “Isabian la Lorraine.” The significant “fame” (wife) which occurs several times in the above list helps us to a peep at the life of the faithful spouse of the jongleur. Decidedly her attainments as a female jongleur, roaming the country with her husband, were absolutely opposed to the dictum of Pericles. The lives of these women were hard, and they were but poorly paid in comparison to their male brethren. It is on record that the Queen’s male “fiddler” in 1497 was paid “in rewarde” £1, 6s. 8d. while the two shillings paid by Henry VIII. to “a woman that singeth with a fiddle” is a pathetic revelation of the proportionately low value set upon woman’s artistic efforts at that time.

Among early amateurs of the bass-viol we find Anne of Cleves, who frequently amused her self by playing on a viol with six strings after her retirement from the turgid trials of her matrimonial life. The picture of a lady similarly occupied, which occurs in a fifteenth-century manuscript entitled “Les Echecs Amoreux,” shows us that the French ladies were also votaries of the viol at that time. In truth, the bass-viol was then a very fashionable instrument both in Europe and England. Shakespeare, who echoed the doings of the day with unerring exactitude, frequently employs the viol in a synonymous sense as, for instance, in Pericles, where the character that gives the title addresses his daughter, Antiochus:

Again in Richard II. the Duke of Norfolk, upon realising the full despair of the word “banishment,” bursts forth into the grand speech beginning:

In Twelfth Night playing the viola da gamba is mentioned as significant of good character. When Maria calls Sir Andrew Aguecheek a fool and prodigal, Sir Toby Belch defends him with:

“Fye, that you’ll say so! he plays o’ the viol di gamboys....”

In a ballad of the time of Charles I., which occurs in Mr Chappelle’s book, “Music of the Olden Time,” among the lady’s numerous accomplishments it is recorded that:

In Mr Pepys’ day, ladies cultivated the viola da gamba with great zest, and were not frowned upon for doing so, but the woman was bold who dared to play the violin. Indeed, the antipathy against that instrument for ladies was still felt at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Spohr, writing from Gotha in 1806, mentions his beloved Dorette’s skill as a violinist. But although admiring her aptitude for that instrument he was averse to seeing his future wife adopt it: “I advised her to discontinue the practice of that instrument so unbecoming to females,” he remarks in his most lofty manner. Mr Pepys, under the date 6th June 1661, makes a similar allusion to women playing the violin: “Here came two young gentlewomen to see Mr Holland, and one of them could play pretty well on the viallin, but how these ignorant people did cry her up for it!” Very different is the diarist’s manner of recounting the performance of a certain Mrs Jaggard on the viola da gamba: “After dinner I to the office ... but business not coming we broke up, and I thither again and took my wife ... to visit my Ladys Jemimah and Paulina Montagu and Mrs Elizabeth Pickering, whom we find at their father’s new house in Lincoln’s In Fields; but the house all in dirt. They received us well enough; but I did not endeavour to carry myself over familiarly with them; and so after a little stay, there coming in presently after us my Lady Aberguenny and other ladies, we back again by coach ... and thence to Jaggards again where a very good supper and great store of plate, and above all after supper Mrs Jaggard did at my entreaty play on the Vyall, but so well as I did not think any woman in England could and but few masters. I must confess it did mightily surprise me, though I knew heretofore that she could play, but little thought so well.” Mr Pepys himself took keen pleasure in playing the viol, and prided himself in being the possessor of “as good a theorbo viall and viallin as is in England.” Mrs Pepys was also permitted by her lord to play the viol, and a certain Mr Gregory, carefully selected by Mr Pepys, “he being an able and sober man,” gave her lessons. The third member of the Pepys’ mÉnage to play the viol was Mrs Pepys’ maid, the coquettish Mercer, who had as pretty a talent for dancing a jig which, according to the gallant Mr Pepys, “she does the best I ever saw,” as playing on that instrument. Professional lady gambists were apparently few in England in the eminent Diarist’s time, but in France they already figured in the Musique du Chambre du Roi, as a Mademoiselle HelÉne Sercamann is mentioned among the “Basses de viole” in 1694. A year later there were three lady “Basses de viole,” Mademoiselles de Caix l’aÎne, de Caix cadette, and de Caix troisiÈme, with their brother in the same band. The French viola da gamba player, Sainte Colombe, had two daughters who played with him at concerts at his house. One of them, says Titon du Tillet, played the viola da gamba and the other the “dessus” or treble viol, and together with their father they frequently played trios.

In the eighteenth century the cult of the gamba amongst English ladies was at its height. It became an indispensable piece of furniture in every house, and no drawing-room was complete without a viola da gamba hung upon the wall, and oh! what a godsend it proved when a dull visitor strained the hostess’s powers of entertainment to their last point.

It was in this century that Dr Burney in his colossal “History of Music” says: “This year and the preceding year [1721-22], Mrs Sarah Ottey frequently performs solos at concerts on three several instruments: harpsichord, bass-viol, and violin.” Although this little paragraph has been frequently quoted, no one appears to have cared to peer deeper into Mrs Ottey’s career. For some reason she has been allowed to live solely on the reputation of these few lines. Thanks, however, to the fact that our British Museum owns Dr Burney’s valuable collection of newspapers, the felicity of digging up a little more of Mrs Sarah Ottey has been possible to us. Apparently her first appearance took place on the 9th March 1720, for The Daily Post of 5th March of that year contains the following advertisement:—

At Stationers’ Hall, near Ludgate, on Wednesday next being the 9th of March, will be performed a Consort of Vocal and Instrumental Musick by the best Masters. For the benefit of Mrs Sarah Ottey, wherein she will perform several Pieces alone on the Harpsichord, Bass Viol, and Violin. To begin exactly at Six a Clock. Tickets to be had at 5s. each, at Mrs Anderson’s at St James’s-Gate, at Rosine’s, White’s, and Williams’s Chocolate Houses, at Mr Hare’s in Cornhill, Mrs Ottey’s in Honey-Lane Market, and at the Hall-Door the said night.

Her next important appearance took place two years later at the “Theatre Royal in Lincoln’s Inn Fields,” where she performed on the three several instruments on the 27th of February 1721. The entertainment was announced “For the Benefit of Mrs Ottey.” A year later she is advertised to play at the same theatre, and the announcement gives the added information that Mrs Ottey’s husband had something to do with the “Carpenter’s Arms,” and that it is her last appearance. These quaint old advertisements are always amusing, so we will not hesitate to give the announcement of the fair gambist’s final appearance in full.

For the Benefit of Mrs Sarah Ottey[33]

At the Theatre Royal, in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, on Tuesday being the 27th February, will be perform’d a comedy call’d Love makes a man, or The Fop’s Fortune, in which will be performed several pieces of musick on the bass-viol, harpsichord and violin by Mrs Ottey (being the last time of her appearing in publick), with several entertainments of dancing.

Tickets to be had at Mr William’s coffee-house in St James’s Street, and at Mr Ottey’s at the Carpenter’s Arms in Honey-Lane Market.

Apparently Mrs Ottey’s career as an artiste extended over but three years—that is, of course, if we are to believe the announcement that it was her last appearance in public on the 27th February 1722/3. In these days such a statement would imply that the said artist or artiste was good for several farewell performances, and a tour round the world as well. But the subjects of King George I., being far removed from twentieth-century customs, were perhaps more veracious in their notifications. Mr and Mrs Ottey having feathered their nest at the Carpenter’s Arms, where the lady’s talented performances were a great attraction to the patrons of the tavern, a little stretch of the imagination may easily see them migrating to a snug little farm in the country, where their dreams of rose bowers and new milk could be indulged in freely for the rest of their lives. Whether this was the true cause of Mrs Ottey’s withdrawal from public life or not, we cannot say, but certain it is that she kept her word, for there is no trace of any further concert appearances in London after the 27th February 1722/3.About fifteen years after Mrs Sarah Ottey’s last bow to a London audience, a baby, who was destined to become a beautiful and talented woman, was presented to Thomas Ford by his wife, nÉe Champion. The auspicious event took place in a house near the Temple, on the 22nd February 1737, and created the usual stir among the happy couple’s relations, who moved among the haute monde. Thomas Ford himself was a clerk of the arraigns, one of his brothers was the Queen’s physician, and the other—Gilbert Ford—occupied a high position as Governor-General of Jamaica. As niece of two such eminent men, and also being dowered with a wealth of beauty and talent, Ann—as her parents christened her—grew up among gentle surroundings, and was received by, and made a favourite of, the most fashionable society. Long before she was twenty, she had tasted of the intoxicating delights of admiration to an extent which would have been sufficient to turn most young girls’ heads. Hone had painted her in the character of a muse, the Earl of Chesterfield had extolled her dancing, and many a lordly beaux had fluttered at her feet. But although she flirted, and played many a dangerous game with her admirers, Ann Ford was endowed with an intellect that sought for something else besides the pastime of varied flirtations. “She is excellent in music, and loves solitude,” wrote one lord to another about her, “and has unmeasurable affectations.”

Not the least of these so-called “affectations” alluded to by her adorer, were Ann Ford’s musical gifts, which she developed with all the powers of her culture-loving mind. Her voice and singing were praised by the most excellent critics of the day, and by many she was esteemed to be quite equal to the favourite Mrs Billington as a vocalist. In one respect, there is no doubt that she surpassed the latter, for one of Ann Ford’s most admired characteristics was the delightful manner in which she could accompany her songs on the guitar or viola da gamba. Like attracts like, and it was only natural, the talents of this clever lady in due course drew the attention of the best musicians of the day. She established a sort of musical salon which was held each Sunday at her house, and to these came Arne, Tenducci, Rauzzini, Pinto, and a host of musical celebrities and fashionable dilettanti. Nothing delighted the music-loving hostess more than these weekly opportunities of welcoming her artist friends, but there was one sting to be found in her cup of happiness, which took the form of her truly British parent, Ford pÈre. He objected strongly to his daughter’s public display of her talents, and neglected no opportunity of showing his disapproval. In spite of his remonstrances, in spite of his displeasure, his spirited daughter still continued to hold her rÉunions each week, and also frequently performed at her friends’ houses.

The abrupt ending of a more than ordinary affaire de coeur with a married man, “a Person of Distinction” brought the climax. Ann Ford decided to fly in the teeth of her parent’s displeasure. She would give a series of Subscription Concerts at the Little Theatre in the Haymarket. In vain did the father forbid the whole thing, and finally resorting to threats, the daughter flew from the paternal roof to the house of a friend. Immediately Ford pÈre procured a magistrate’s warrant wherewith he secured the person of his wayward child and brought her home. But neither warrants, nor lock and key, could deter Ann Ford from her purpose, and she managed to elude her father’s vigilance and escape again. The sensationalism caused by these incidents brought friends old and new thronging round the distressed lady. The heart of aristocracy was touched, and the first of Ann Ford’s series of subscription concerts on the 18th March 1760 furnished her with £1,500. Still her troubles were not at an end, for her father, on the night of the concert, employed a number of ruffians to surround the theatre and these were only dispersed by Lord Sackville’s threats to send for a detachment of the Guards.

The programme of this first concert was included in the following advertisement which appeared in The Public Advertiser on the 17th March 1760:—

Miss Ford’s First Subscription Concert

will be to-morrow the 18th instant at the Little Theatre in the Haymarket. As the Pit, Boxes, and Gallery are the same Price, the latter will be equally illuminated with wax-candles.

First Part. Overture of Pasquali: Song by Miss Ford, Voi Legete; Concerto Hautboy, Mr Simpson; Song, Miss Ford, Gentle Youth, etc.; Solo, Miss Ford, on the Viol di Gamba.

Second Part. Concerto Bassoon, Mr Miller; Song, Miss Ford, Sparge Amar; Solo Violin, Mr Pinto, Song, Return O God of Host, Full piece of French Horns.Tickets at half-a-guinea each, to be had at the Theatre; at Mr Deard’s; at Mr Garden’s in St Paul’s Church Yard; and at Mr Walsh’s in Catherine-Street. No Persons to be admitted behind the Scenes.

To begin at Seven o’Clock.

No more tickets will be delivered than the house will contain.

The second concert took place on the 25th of March, when she is announced to take the “Vocal Parts” and play “a solo on the Viol di Gambo” as well as “a Concerto on the Guittar.”

Money being plentiful, the announcement of Ann Ford’s third concert on the 7th April is more lavishly displayed, the solo on the “Viol di Gambo” being, in particular, inserted in large type as a special attraction. For Monday, the 14th April, she requisitioned the services of three other artists. The programme for this concert appears in The Public Advertiser of Friday, 11th April 1760, in the following order:—

Miss Ford’s Fourth Subscription Concert

will be on Monday the 14th instant, at the Little Theatre in the Haymarket.The vocal Parts by Miss Ford, who will play a solo on the

Viol di Gambo

Overture

Non fai qual pena fia. Song. Concerti Traversa by Sen. G. Sweet Bird. Song. Solo, Viol di Gambo. Concerto Violoncello, Sen. Pasqualini. Hush ye pretty warbling Choir. Song. Solo Violin, Mr Pinto. Duetto, Caro Spiegar Voirei.

Lesson on the Guittar, and (by particular Desire) the 104th Psalm.

Full Piece

Tickets to be had.........

To begin at Seven o’Clock.

Her fifth and last concert took place on Tuesday, 22nd April, when, besides taking the “vocal parts,” she played a solo and accompanied herself in a song (“Oh! Liberty thou choicest treasure”) on the Viola di Gambo, also performing “a lesson on the guittar” and singing “a Hymn set by herself,” which she accompanied on the lute.

These five concerts completed the series announced and for the rest of that year Ann Ford abstained from further appearances on the concert platform. During the interval, she occupied herself in addressing a brilliant little pamphlet to her former lover, which was intended to contradict the scandalous imputations which were being noised abroad concerning her friendship with the married man. This letter was published in 1761, under the title of “A Letter from Miss F..d to a person of distinction.” The pathetic manner in which she chides his lordship for his attempt to overthrow her virtue, and her gentle despair at his sudden unfriendliness towards her, reads more like the attempt of a clever woman to raise public sympathy on her behalf rather than genuine dejection. The “person of distinction” whom she addressed replied to her in a somewhat derisive letter, in which he endeavours to reveal Miss Ford’s pique to arise from the fact, that he and his spouse did not support her subscription concerts handsomely. The publication of such letters certainly did neither party good, though from the point of view of literary excellence, Ann Ford surpassed her lordly lover.

Having become entirely dependent on herself through her direct opposition to her father’s wishes, Ann Ford again made another bid for public favour at the end of the following year. From the 24th to the 30th of October she was announced to sing “English airs accompanying herself on the musical glasses” daily in the large room, Cock’s Auction-room, Spring Gardens, and before the following year she published her “Instructions for playing on the Musical Glasses.” This was before the introduction of the “armonica” by Marianne Davies, so that the instrument employed by Ann Ford consisted simply of a series of glasses containing various quantities of water. This sort of art could have hardly been to her taste, and she very soon threw it up. In the following month she accompanied her friends, Lady Elizabeth Thicknesse and her husband, Philip Thicknesse, to Landguard Fort, of which the latter was Lieutenant-Governor. Shortly after their arrival Lady Thicknesse gave birth to a son, whom she lived to see only a few months old, as she died on the 28th March 1762. Circumstances thus threw the whole care of the child upon Ann Ford, and so devoted and sympathetic a foster-mother did she prove herself to be that, six months after his wife’s death, Philip Thicknesse made Ann Ford his (third) wife.

For some years after this event Ann Thicknesse lived a life of peaceful happiness, residing in the summer months at Felixstowe Cottage. This residence was the subject of an enthusiastic article in “The School of Fashion,” 1800, and Gainsborough’s sketch of it was published in The Gentleman’s Magazine (vol. ii. 1816). During the years of her married life, Mrs Thicknesse turned her attention to literature, and while residing in Bath, from 1778 to 1781, wrote her sketches of the “Lives and Writings of the Ladies of France,” which filled three volumes.

In 1792, an abrupt ending to this placid existence was caused by the sudden death of Philip Thicknesse at Boulogne, where Ann and her husband had made a temporary halt on their way to Italy. In spite of the danger entailed by English people in France at that time, Ann Thicknesse intrepidly remained in that country after her husband’s death, and paid for her temerity by arrest and confinement in a convent, where she remained for two years. With the execution of Robespierre and the liberation of all prisoners who could prove themselves capable of earning their own living, Ann Thicknesse easily gained her liberty and returned to England. In 1800 her novel, “The School of Fashion,” in which she introduced many well-known characters under fictitious names (she herself figuring under the guise of Euterpe) appeared.

The latter years of this brilliant woman’s life were spent with a friend who lived in the Edgware Road, and she died there, at the age of eighty, on the 20th January 1824. It is given to few to pass through such an eventful life as Ann Ford’s, and live to such ripe years. Beautiful, popular, a gifted linguist and musician, all these conspired to make her a prominent figure among the women of her day. Hone and Gainsborough painted her portrait, fashionable society raved about her and read her writings, and—she played upon a favourite viola da gamba “made in 1612, of exquisite workmanship and mellifluous tone.”

By Particular Desire
At the little Theatre in the Haymarket.
This Day, April 23, there will be a Concert of
Vocal and Instrumental Music.
The vocal parts by Signor Tenducci, Signora Calori,
and Signor Qualici.

The Solos by young Performers, who never appeared in Public, as a solo of Signor Giardini’s on the Violin by his scholar, Master Barron, thirteen years old; a Lesson on the Harpsichord by Miss Burney, nine years old; with a Sonata of Signor Giardini’s accompanied by a Violin; a Sonata on the Violoncello by Master Cervetto, eleven years old; a Duet on the Violin and Violoncello by Master Barron and Master Cervetto; a Quartette by Miss Schmeling, Master Barron, Master Cervetto and Miss Burney. With several full Pieces by a select Band of the best performers.

The doors to be opened at five o’clock. To begin at seven. Pit and Boxes laid together at Half-a-guinea. Gallery, Five shillings. Tickets to be had at Arthur’s, St James’s Street; at Mr Walsh’s music-shop, Catherine Street; at Mr Johnson’s music-shop, Cheapside, and at the Theatre; where Ladies are desired to send their servants to keep places.—Public Advertiser, 23rd April 1760.